195 pages ; 24 cm

"Romance novels have had a bad reputation as trashy, sex-filled fantasy escapes for frustrated housewives. But romances account for nearly half of the fictional paperbacks published. To analyze this phenomenon, the critics looked at the conventions or patterns which the romances use to tell their stories." "Looking at some conventions from a new angle, the essayists found that the power of the romance genre is its ability to gaze both backward to earlier histories and forms and forward into new experimental forms. How well each romance writer uses the conventions of her craft to make the old seem new provides the critics with material for their observations." "By inspecting the craft of romance writing, the essayists hope to encourage the increased appreciation of this popular art of storytelling."--Jacket

Includes bibliographical references

Conventions of the romantic genre / Anne K. Kaler -- The good provider in romance novels / Pamela Marks -- From bodice-ripper to baby-sitter : the new hero in mass-market romance / Abby Zidle -- "I am not a bimbo" : persona, promotion, and the fabulous Fabio / Rosemary E. Johnson-Kurek -- This is not your mother's Cinderella : the romance novel as feminist fairy tale / Jennifer Crusie Smith -- Cavewoman impulses : the Jungian shadow archetype in popular romantic fiction / Amber Botts -- Medieval magic and witchcraft in the popular romance novel / Carol Ann Breslin -- Conventions of captivity in romance novels / Anne K. Kaler -- Time-travel and related phenomena in contemporary popular romance fiction / Diane M. Calhoun-French -- Leading us into temptation : the language of sex and the power of love / Rosemary E. Johnson-Kurek -- Postmodern identity (crisis) : confessions of a linguistic historiographer and romance writer / Julie Tetel Andresen -- Hero, heroine, or Hera? / Anne K. Kaler

plus-circle Add Review

comment

Reviews